More than 100,000 people - mainly women - have been prosecuted for the crime of witchcraft between 1450 and 1750 in Europe and colonial America. During the early modern period, the prominent stereotype of the witch as an evil magician and servant of Satan emerged. This collection of trial records, laws, treatises, sermons, speeches, woodcuts, paintings and literary texts illustrates how contemporaries from various periods have perceived alleged witches and their activities. Brian Levack reveals how notions of witchcraft and its visual depiction changed over time. He looks at the connections between gender and witchcraft and the nature of the witch's perceived power. This anthology provides students of the history of witchcraft with a broad range of sources and learned commentary and background by one of the leading scholars of the field.

List of illustrations

ix

Preface

xi

Acknowledgments

xiii

Introduction

1

(4)

PART I Witchcraft and magic in the Ancient World

5

(26)

1 The witch of Endor

7

(3)

2 A sorcery trial in the second century CE

10

(4)

3 Curse tablets against Roman charioteers

14

(2)

4 Apuleius: the power of witches

16

(6)

5 Horace: Canidia as a witch figure

22

(3)

6 Love magic in antiquity

25

(2)

7 St Augustine: demonic power in early Christianity

27

(4)

PART II The medieval foundations of witch-hunting

31

(38)

8 Canon law and witchcraft

33

(3)

9 St Thomas Aquinas: scholasticism and magic

36

(3)

10 The trial of Dame Alice Kyteler, 1324

39

(4)

11 Nicholas Eymeric: magic and heresy, 1376

43

(4)

12 The University of Paris: a condemnation of magic, 1398

47

(5)

13 Johannes Nider: an early description of the witches' sabbath, 1435

52

(5)

14 Heinrich Kramer: Malleus maleficarum, 1486

57

(12)

PART III Witch beliefs in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

69

(48)

15 Lambert Daneau: Protestantism and witchcraft, 1574

71

(6)

16 Henri Boguet: the threat of witchcraft, 1602

77

(5)

17 Nicolas Remy: the Devil's mark and flight to the sabbath, 1595

82

(6)

18 Martin Del Rio: the maleficia of witches, 1600

88

(6)

19 William Perkins: good and bad witches, 1608

94

(5)

20 Francesco Maria Guazzo: the pact with the Devil, 1608

99

(5)

21 Pierre de Lancre: dancing and sex at the sabbath, 1612

104

(6)

22 Cotton Mather: the apocalypse and witchcraft, 1692

110

(3)

23 James Hutchinson: children, the covenant, and witchcraft, 1697

113

(4)

PART IV The trial and punishment of witches

117

(56)

24 Innocent VIII: papal inquisitors and witchcraft, 1484

119

(4)

25 Heinrich Kramer: the torture of accused witches, 1486

123

(5)

26 Jean Bodin: witchcraft as an excepted crime, 1580

128

(7)

27 Henri Boguet: the conduct of a witchcraft judge, 1602

135

(5)

28 King James VI: the swimming and pricking of witches, 1597

140

(5)

29 Friedrich Spee: a condemnation of torture, 1631

145

(9)

30 Sir Robert Filmer: the discovery of witches, 1652

154

(4)

31 Sir George Mackenzie: judicial caution in the trial of witches, 1678

158

(5)

32 King Louis XIV of France: the decriminalization of French witchcraft, 1682

163

(4)

33 Christian Thomasius: the prohibition of torture, 1705

167

(4)

34 The repeal of the English and Scottish witchcraft statutes, 1736

171

(2)

PART V Witchcraft trials in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

173

(58)

35 The confession of Niclas Fiedler at Trier, 1591

175

(4)

36 The trial of Françatte Camont in Lorraine, 1598

179

(6)

37 The confessions of witches in Guernsey, 1617

185

(5)

38 The trial and confession of Elizabeth Sawyer, 1621

190

(8)

39 The confessions of Johannes Junius at Bamberg, 1628

198

(5)

40 The witch-hunt at Eichstätt, 1637

203

(7)

41 The trial of Janet Barker and Margaret Lauder at Edinburgh, 1643

210

(4)

42 A Russian witch-trial at Lukh, 1657

214

(6)

43 The Salem witchcraft trials, 1692

220

(11)

PART VI Demonic possession and witchcraft

231

(44)

44 Johann Weyer: the possession of the nuns at Wertet, 1550

235

(4)

45 Henri Boguet: the possession of Loyse Maillat, 1598

239

(4)

46 The possession of Marthe Brossier, 1599

243

(6)

47 Edward Jorden: demonic possession and disease, 1603

249

(3)

48 The possessions at Loudun, 1634

252

(9)

49 Cotton Mather: the possession of the Goodwin children, 1688

261

(5)

50 The possession of Christian Shaw, 1697

266

(9)

PART VII The skeptical tradition

275

(44)

51 Johann Weyer: witches as melancholics, 1563

277

(8)

52 Reginald Scot: the unreality of witchcraft, 1584

285

(8)

53 Alonso de Salazar Frias: the unreliability of confessions, 1612

293

(6)

54 Thomas Hobbes: the nature of demons, 1651

299

(6)

55 Baruch Spinoza: the non-existence of the Devil, 1661, 1675

305

(2)

56 John Webster: witchcraft and the occult, 1677

307

(6)

57 Balthasar Bekker: the disenchantment of the world, 1695

313

(6)

PART VIII Dramatic representations of witchcraft

319

(26)

58 Seneca: the witch in classical drama

321

(4)

59 Fernando de Rojas: the witch figure in the Renaissance, 1499

325

(4)

60 Thomas Middleton: the witch in English drama, 1613

329

(6)

61 Hans Wiers-Jenssen: a Norwegian witchcraft drama, 1917

335

(10)

Index

345

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